A Little Change
by Alex Mcpherson
Summary: A series of shorts, establishing how things might have played out if certain things did in fact go according to plan... or rather to a different one.
1. Chapter 1

**'A Slight change'** How certain episodes would be different, sorta, if other things happened early, or late, or ... well you'll get the picture.

**Episode Tag: 1x07 "Eye of the Needle"** - I think. The Telek R'Mor/20-year wormhole episode.

_Starfleet Command, 5 days after the loss of the USS Voyager._

Admiral Owen Paris looked up sharply, and barked, "What did you say?"

"I said we've received a high-priority transmission from the Romulan Senate, in regards to the whereabouts of Voyager, calling for you sir." His aide spoke, really confused and a bit afraid even of what that meant.

He nodded and motioned to his wall display screen. "Put it on screen."

A moment later, the somewhat familiar face of the current head of the Romulan Senate, a woman who seemed to have risen to power too quickly after her husbands death, was on the screen, and she was smiling a little.

"Admiral Paris, I presume."

"Praetor, I am honored to speak with you."

"I'm sure." The sarcasm was subtle, but clear. "I think the honor is mine, however. As the initial message said, I am calling you in regards to your missing vessel, the USS Voyager. My intelligence officer surveilling your ship captured the entire visual record of its disappearance, however, what I am about to send to you is somewhat, unrelated."

"Unrelated, how?"

"Messages from the crew." She said simply, then after a pause, "A situation occured, directly related to these messages, 20 years ago with the science vessel Talvath. The ship came across a micro-wormhole, in the last stages of decay. It's end point was roughly, in the future. Specifically, the Talvoth maintained communications with Voyager through time. The Talvaths' captain made a promise to Captain Janeway, Admiral, to pass on the messages, but only after Voyager was lost. I'm sure your temporal investigations department is at the very last glad that we held back to protect the timeline. Unforunately, he died some time ago, however, by then he had already known he would not live to see his promise through himself. He requested that the senate passes the messages on."

"Forgive me for perhaps sounding ungrateful, but why would the _head_ of the senate contact me personally to do so?"

"The captain of the Talvath was my husband, Admiral." She spoke sadly. "He was, fond, of the ship. He had spent a short time aboard, and thanks to some of the advances in our sciences we had made due to the co-operation between him and voyager in allowing transportation through a wormhole, and the advances in long-range communications, he had a lot of influence in the senate, even before I became Praetor. Even if I were merely a councillor on the senate, I would still be the one to contact you. Even if I were not at all, I still would. Those advances in our sciences did a lot to cement the decision to allow this communication. AS we speak, a high-speed courier vessel is heading for the neutral zone, and will directly transmit the messages to whichever vessel you send to wait..."

_Neutral Zone, USS Enterprise-D_

Riker looked at the empty space. "I don't like this." He muttered.

"Neither do I, number one. but Starfleet command gave this top priority, and sent the Farragut to armagosa instead."

Riker simply nodded.

After several hours, Data spoke up from Ops. "Sir, I believe a romulan warbird has entered the system under minimal cloak... Indeed, they are heading towards us."

"Red Alert." Picard called.

"Sir..." Riker spoke up, "If they're heading for us under minimal cloak, that means they want us to see them."

"I am aware of that. It also means that there are likely several other ships under full cloak with them."

"Sir, I am receiving a hail from the Romulan warbird." Worf spoke up. "Audio and Visual."

"Onscreen."

A familiar face appeared. "Captain Picard." Tomalak greeted with a small sad smile.

And so, many changes occured. Pathfinder Project made contact by Voyagers' 5th year, rather than near the end of their 6th. The ship that was to be the Enterprise-E was instead given a different name, and the 5th Sovereign class rather than the 2nd took the name after the -D was lost in the dominion war to the Son'a's defence of some ketracel white facility. Suffice to say, that put a premature end to their co-operation in the Baku sector, and the federation council put that project on hold until safe methods to harnass that radiation could be found, as prime directive applying or not many who would have allowed it to happen, had the time to actually think before saying no on the relocation part of the deal.

With borg technology specs transmitted back aswell, thanks to care used with the hirogen relay system that allowed voyager to send more, plus the pathfinder allowing limited communication, well, the dominion war wasn't over, and the borg enhancements to the Defiant, Akira, Sovereign and Steamrunner designs greatly increased their combat longevity.

Jadzia, having not spent more than a peripheral amount of time with worf (which was only when he took the temporary assignment to DS9 before returning to the Enterprise with that whole invasion of carddassia crap) wasn't on DS9 when the battle of chintoka took place. The wormhole still collapsed, but Ben Sisko wasn't greiving for loosing a mentor and best friend and so remained in the war, indeed, improving their prospects.

Also, the Praetor learned of the whole Shinzon thing sometime before even speaking with the federation about Voyager, so that incident didn't even happen. well, sort of. She requested the Ent-E to head to romulus to further peace talks, hoping for something along the lines of the federation-klingon relationship. Learning of Rikers' wedding, she even joined them for the entire thing on Betazed. In this timeline, worf did indeed have to obey the customs, and Data found much amusement.

On the way there was an incident with remans who had attacked in a vessel that would have been bigger and badder with shinzon's part of the whole thing, but since he wasn't part of it, the Ent-E of this timeline was matched evenly with that ship. And it didn't have thalaron weapons.

'Course, with 4 Valdore ships that had been under 'perfect' cloak to escort the ship through romulan space, that battle didn't last long, and ended in their favour rather, favourably.

And all the peace stuff? Meant that the hobus thing didn't exactly happen. well, romulus wasn't destroyed.

Seeing all t his, Q decided on what would happen if Telek R'Mor forgot to get his wife to send those messages for him... with a snap of his fingers, he nodded and went to observe...

Hmm, hirogen relay thing being when the federation learn... oh prometheus being hijacked? that didn't happen before...


	2. Chapter 2

**'A Slight change'** How certain episodes would be different, sorta, if other things happened early, or late, or ... well you'll get the picture. Seperate from the previous chapter.

**Episode Tag: 4x? "Message in a bottle"** - Prometheus, Hirogen Relay network, and a little EMH modification added on...

_Astrometrix, USS Voyager._

"Doctor, I've managed to make it so that you can keep all your additional... ah, modes..." Harry spoke.

"ECH?" He asked.

Harry nodded, "Yes." The Doctor nodded back, and Harry continued. "Your command codes should work on the starfleet vessel, since I've also added special circumstance ones."

"Huh?"

Seven spoke up, "Essentially, codes that will alert the vessel you are transferred to that you are from a stranded ship."

"There are codes for that?"

Amused, Captain Janeway nodded, "We're not the first to be stranded far from home, and not the first to attempt something like this. If you need to, you should be able to take command, if such a situation crops up."

"Of course. Well... I feel the urge to say something profound, however I thankfully do not have Mr Paris' eloqy-" The Doctor disappeared.

"Seven." Kathryn chided.

Seven merely raised her right eyebrow, and continued to work on sending the doctor across the galaxy.

_USS Prometheus_

The Doctor glared at the EMH Mk 2. "I must take control of this ship before we get ourselves killed."

On the screen, a battle raged between 3 starfleet ships and 2 romulan warbirds.

"How?"

the Doctor shook his head, and spoke up, hoping it would work. "Computer, engage Program Voyager-Emergency Command Hologram."

The blue of his uniform fizzled in that holographic way to red, and he moved to the captains chair. "Computer, engage evasive maneouvres, Pattern Delta-3. Armed phasers, lock targets on the romulan warbirds. Return fire only."

The ship shook, and immediately the EMH Mk2 was shocked to see their own ship fire back, shot for shot but no more.

'Course, then both surrounded them and the larger warbids still outgunned them, well, sort of.

"Computer, what is Multi-vector assault mode? It sounds as though this ship should seperate to, attack from multiple vectors..." The ECH spoke.

"Affirmative. This ship is designed to seperate into 3 distinct independant vessels, while also capable of being remotely controlled from the main bridge of the upper saucer module."

"Open a channel to the Romulan ships." He spoke, and waited for the tell-tale sound of a channel open. "This is the USS Prometheus to Romulan warbirds, you have 10 seconds to cease your attack and retreat, or we will fire with impunity. End transmission."

the EMH Mk2 of the ship was aghast. "Doctor?"

The sound of a channel opening was heard, and the ECH merely said, "5 Seconds." the channel closed... and the other federation ships moved into formation, not firing whilt eh romulans too had ceased firing to contemplate their actions...

Only to fire a full barage of torpedoes at them.

"Shields at 74 Percent." the computer announced.

"Initiate Multi-vector assault mode. Target the romulan ships, Disable one, destroy the other, and co-ordinate with the other vessel's tactical officers..."

After a minute, the battle was over, and the Doctor called, "Computer, reintegrate the ship, and set course for the nearest Starbase. relay intended course and request escort from the others."

"Incoming hail."

"Onscreen."

Q pondered that change. Wondered what the long term effects was, and looking ahead, saw it wasn't as big as he'd thought, although Dr Zimmerman did look to creating an 'ECH mk 2', although that failed.

Seems Voyagers' ECH was a one off, for the time being...


	3. Chapter 3

**A Slight Change - Delta Flyer part 1**

Only specific episode featured or mentioned: Future's End.

Formatting corrected

Here goes nothing.

_During 'Future's End'_.

Tom looked at the comic on the stand, it looked like one of the original versions of a series he used to collect as a kid. Centuries had done a lot to severely alter the basic premise, but it was clsoe enough that he recognised the series in the first place. Looking up at Chakotay, the man rolled his eyes and nodded, so Tom used some of their replicated currency to purchase several of the issues. They promplty went into a bag, which found its way to Voyager sometime between then and when they were hunting down that technology-stealing businessman.

_Back in the Delta Quadrant._

Tom shook his head, these originals were much better than their 24th century descendants... for all it's ridiculousness compared to the time these comics originated from. The ones he'd read as a kid weren't all that big on using ideas beyond the time. Transporters were there, for instance, but were'nt a big thing, and the writers tended to keep pushing on limitations to everything, making sure nothing was a fix-all.

But these... the writers of these ones weren't that careful like that.

He smiled as an idea occured to him.

The comics featured things ahead of the time they were written in, but pretty much every bit of technology one would think of needing to get at minimum, the effect of the fictional technology, did indeed exist. Hell, these, transformers, one issue had explained, used "Matter-energy storage containers" where some of their 'body' goes when they're in a particularly small mode. which is why that one that shifted into a gun could be picked up in the gun mode by any human, but not even a double-strength human could shift it in it's bipedal mode.

True, long-term storage of complex things like living matter was still not much use beyond one person - he did remember the report about when the Enterprise-D encountered a Dyson sphere, and how some of the crew of a ship, Jeno-something, had been in the transporter buffers for years, but only one Montgomery Scott was recoverable.

But then, some things like all except the really complex systems literally could be stored in one of Voyagers' typical transporter buffers, for a long time. With living matter, it was that it was living, with some sort of bio-energy he'd never learned about, that made the storage difficult...

And so, an idea had blossomed. He also thought that maybe he should go ahead with that large shuttle idea he had. It's width, with this sort of thing in mind, wouldn't have to be smaller than the shuttlebay doors...

_A Month later._

Tom stared at the blueprints that he'd drawn up, then he looked at the basic shell that lay in only a few, large, pieces in the cargo bay. It would be a simple matter and beaming the hulk over to the shuttlebay when its at the point ready for those systems that couldn't be transported.

Beside him, B'Elanna and Harry were looking between him, the blueprints, and the shuttle.

The blueprints they were glancing at only showed it's basic look in 'compact' mode, the, larger mode was detailed on numerous other blueprints that were still rolled up in their tube packaging, elsewhere on the ship.

"I honestly have no idea what this here," B'Elanna pointed to something, "is for. Seriously, it's not gonna be connected to anything. You don't need it."

Tom coughed, and shaking his head, began to grin as he replied, "trust me, everything is there for a reason. Won't you let me surprise you?"

Harry nodded, but B'Elanna interupted, "The fact that you want this thing capable of Warp 8 minimum, and with shields as powerful as voyagers', means that you have to have the permission of both myself to ensure it's built right, and the permission of the captain to own it." She turned fully to him. "I won't say yes until I know exactly what it is you're building, and these blueprints are not the whole picture."

"I know..." Tom agreed, "got the rest of it on blueprints in my quarters." He ignored her questioning looks, and continued, "I can show you better on the holodeck though. It's where I made the design before having these printed."

"Let's go." She ordered, and with a chuckle, the two men followed her out.

B'Elanna took a walk around the holographic projection of the shuttlebay. Thanks to only 3 of them, the holodeck managed to manipulate things to allow them to appear further apart than the holodeck, deactivated, would have allowed.

"It's too big to fit through the doors." She commented.

"Nope. Computer, simulate launch of Delta Flyer." He commanded. The mock shuttle rose up and slowly departed the simulated bay, and they saw it fit, only just mind, through the ships' shuttlebay door. "Reset."

The shuttle shimmered back into its pre-launch position.

"Now this is where the extra stuff you haven't seen comes into play. Computer, simulate Delta Flyer command 'Bumblebee'."

In shock, Harry and B'Elanna watched as the shuttle literally began to shift, hull plates moving (some disappearing with a familiar transporter effect, they would later remember seeing) until the shuttle had reduced in size, and the 'cockpit could be seen now in the middle of the, vehicle that sat on wheels before them.

Then the hull plates moved back into place, only in new places, and the visible parts shifted into a metallic yellow and grey design.

"Is this a... truck?" Harry asked.

It indeed was. Otherwise known as large SUVs. Only with the same interior style as the shuttle form, they could see through the open windows.

"The cargo bay area of the Flyer is the, ahm, Boot here." he pointed out, as he took them into the simulated vehicle. He took the 'drivers' seat, which had a steering wheel and other such controls, while their stations where to his side and behind him on the same level, Chuckling, he then said, "Computer, simulate Delta Flyer command 'shuttle'."

They all found being within it during transformation somewhat disconcerting, but Tom also enjoyed it.

They watched as their stations shifted apart some, until it was how they'd seen it before, with Tom just slightly off-center, in the front lower part of the cockpit, Harry's port-side station had moved from the "Front passenger" position to the upper mid-section of the cockpit, while B'Elannas was now alongside him.

The rest of the cockpit that had disappeared before, reformed around them, some things popping up from hidden places, some materialising, transporter style. The hull itself reconfigured and reformed.

Tom told them, seriously, "I'm intending for the Flyer to be capable of transformation in space. Atmospheric forcefield around inhabited areas and whatnot."

A Beep indicated that transformation was complete.

Instead of just calling for it, Tom then took the flight sticks (which prompted Harry and B'Elanna to wonder where the wheel had disappeared to) and launched the shuttle in space. (Well, you know, holospace. Ha. Geddit?)

Then he entered a command into his side panel, and he had barely warned them when it began to change and shift again, "Entering Battlemode."

They spent the next half hour, slowly assimilating just what sort of project Tom had intended to recruit them for, and starting to have fun at the same time.

_A year later_

Seven merely raised an eyebrow at the, 'surprise' he had for her.

"This is a larger shuttle that Voyager was equipped on launch." She spoke, levelly. "It is only logical that at some point you were to build a shuttle designed to your circumstance, than continually rebuild small craft that had not been intended for long term unsupported deployment."

Tom nodded, but smiled wider, "That's not the surprise, Seven."

"Indeed."

"Alright." He looked at the shuttle, and a bit louder than perhaps needed, spoke, "Delta Flyer, 'Bumblebee'."

She was shocked, as the very large shuttle reduced in size, and changed its configuration and overall look, until it had formed into a wheeled land vehicle... although she was sure, no such vehicle from Earths' history had had impulse engines, nor the hidden warp nacelles she could see subtly melded into it's form (she only caught that thanks to her borg implants)

Then she registered that the vehicle's new shape would not allow it to turn within the room to face the doors. No space existed for a... what did he call it in that holoprogram the captain had insisted on her visiting some time ago... a '3 point turn'...

"Should make peeking around industrial-level prewarp cultures easier." He inserted. "I've even redesigned and rebuilt two of our smaller shuttles for the same kind of shift. Shuttle and land vehicle modes. They become much smaller vehicles as a result, but without the flying parts. But the Flyer's special."

She only nodded, her equilibrium restored within seconds. "Indeed."

"Return to shuttle mode." He spoke up at the shuttle, and it indeed reshifted back into place.

"Some of its' parts are stored within transporter buffers?" She asked a little. He nodded. "Degradation would give cause for regular maintenance" She began. He nodded a little hesitantly, "Perhaps I can upgrade this... Delta Flyer's systems, improve efficiency and perhaps allow... other modes?"

He nodded, with a smile.


End file.
